RLT Recruits 'A Few Good Men'
Military Culture Pivotal in Courtroom Drama
This article was published on Thursday, April 13, 2006 10:23 PM CDT in Entertainment
By Becca Bacon Martin
The Morning News
ROGERS -- Like Uncle Sam, director Rick Pierson was looking for "A Few Good Men" for the Rogers Little Theater production of Aaron Sorkin's military drama.
In the end, though, it turned out to be one good man who made the difference -- both in the story and on the stage.
In the 1989 play, Lt. j.g. Daniel Kaffee, a rookie Navy attorney, is assigned to the case of two Marines charged with murder.
Educated at Harvard, Kaffee knows almost nothing about the culture of the Marine Corps, but he soon discovers that that culture is the key to defending Pfc. Louden Downey and Lance Cpl. Harold Dawson. The two, both assigned to the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, allegedly attacked a fellow Marine, Pfc. William Santiago, in a secretly sanctioned hazing called a "Code Red."
Santiago died --and that turned the hazing into murder.
In Sorkin's masterfully woven tale, the fate of the two Marines -- and the fate of their commanding officer, the irascible Lt. Col. Nathan Jessep -- landed in Kaffee's hands.
In the real world, Pierson's fate -- and the fate of the Rogers Little Theater production -- landed in the hands of a Rogers attorney, Ed McClure. A veteran of the RLT stage as both actor and director, McClure didn't know anything about military culture, either. But when the actor cast as Jessep left the show, McClure discovered that he had about three weeks to learn to play one of two pivotal characters in "A Few Good Men."
"To those of us who consider ourselves moderate, Jessep is the obvious villain of the show, because he is the one that takes the very hawkish, very pro-military approach," McClure muses. "But he really speaks the truth. He has this great speech where he sort of chastises liberals everywhere: 'You want me out there defending the country, you rise and sleep under the blanket of freedom I provide, but then you criticize the way I provide it.'
"His attitude is if I provide you that freedom, it doesn't matter how I do it," McClure says. "Kaffee argues that it does matter if it's a violation of our Constitution."
Both the director and Tom Pyron, the actor cast as the play's protagonist, Kaffee, are former Marines, and both said their experiences have served them well.
"I hadn't done a left-face in 20 years, and when I starting showing the actors, it came right back," director Pierson says, chuckling. "I've been able to help teach them how to march, how to dress their uniforms properly, how to carry themselves," Pyron adds. "But as Kaffee, I'm pretty much free to do whatever I want, as opposed to playing a Marine!"
The pervasive attitude of following orders at all costs is more difficult to learn, McClure says. He turned to a friend now serving in Iraq to help him understand the role of Jessep.
"He gave me so much insight into the military," he says. "It is a whole different mind-set, and you have to understand it not only so you can understand the characters but to understand the context of the play."
Pierson is sure most veterans of military service "will see themselves in certain roles," but Pyron thinks audience members without direct military experience will identify with Kaffee.
"The reason why this story is worthy of being told is because he learns to appreciate what the military is and what it does for our country and the world," says Pyron.
"I personally agree with Jessep, and I think Kaffee also comes to agree with him. But Kaffee has an oath to keep, just like Jessep does -- and therein lie the checks and balances in our government."
